Automatic hand gun

ABSTRACT

This invention relates to a recoil-actuated automatic hand gun, which provides for utilizing a maximum sized cartridge in a hand gun system. The reactive thrust as the bullet leaves the muzzle of this gun causes a barrel, barrel extension, receiver, and bolt to slide back locked together a set distance during initial motion until the bullet leaves the bore of the gun, and the gas pressure decreases to a level low enough to permit the safe unlocking of a locked breech action. The sliding receiver reaches its limit of travel and hits a portion of the frame of the pistol. A through-slot in the bolt bears cam surfaces which rotate the bolt out of breech-locking splines in the breech action thereby to release the bolt from engagement with the receiver and permit the inertia of the bolt to carry it backwards to perform ejection, cocking, and the loading of a new cartridge. In order to replace some of the dissipated energy and to increase the speed of travel of the bolt to load spring-return mechanisms, and to perform the functions of the bolt with the speed required, a rotary, mechanical accelerator forms a part of the action and imparts a blow to the bolt at the time that the receiver reaches its stop position. The bolt is rotated out of the breechlocked position by balanced cam follower means fixed to the frame that follow the cam surfaces, and upon return to the breechlocked lock position, the entire assembly travels as a unit to the battery position with a loaded cartridge in the chamber. A safety tappet pin engages a spiral groove in the bolt to prevent premature firing before the action has reached an appropriate position. The bolt is adapted with unique ejection means, which ejects the spent cartridge case forward and away from the shooter&#39;&#39;s head and face.

United States Patent 1 Sanford Dec. 25, 1973 AUTOMATIC HAND GUN [75]Inventor: Harry W. Sanford, Arcadia, Calif.

[73] Assignee: James C. Thomas, III, Encino, Calif.

[22] Filed: May 20, 1971 21 Appl. No.: 145,259

[52] US. Cl. 89/150, 42/78, 89/1 K, 89/138, 89/169, 89/172, 89/199 [51]Int. Cl. F4ld 3/06, F4ld 11/02 [58] Field of Search 89/1 K, 145, 150,89/154, 172, 185, 199

[56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 512,437 l/l894 Griffiths etal 89/172 1,347,756 7/1920 Payne 89/185 1,704,889 3/1929 Gardiner 89/1501,807,727 6/1931 Brinkerhoff.... 89/150 1,854,064 4/1932 Revelli 89/172FOREIGN PATENTS OR APPLICATIONS 351,597 7/1905 France 89/172 PrimaryExaminer-Stephen C. Bentley Attorney-D. Gordon Angus and Donald D.'Mon

[57] ABSTRACT This invention relates to a recoil-actuated automatic handgun, which provides for utilizing a maximum sized cartridge in a handgun system. The reactive thrust as the bullet leaves the muzzle of thisgun causes a barrel, barrel extension, receiver, and bolt to slide backlocked together a set distance during initial motion until the bulletleaves the bore of the gun, and the gas pressure decreases to a levellow enough to permit the safe unlocking of a locked breech action. Thesliding receiver reaches its limit of travel and hits a portion of theframe of the pistol. A through-slot in the bolt bears cam surfaces whichrotate the bolt out of breech-locking splines in the breech actionthereby to release the bolt from engagement with the receiver and permitthe inertia of the bolt to carry it backwards to perform ejection,cocking, and the loading of a new cartridge. In order to replace some ofthe dissipated energy and to increase the speed of travel of the bolt toload spring-return mechanisms, and to perform the functions of the boltwith the speed required, a rotary, mechanical accelerator forms a partof the action and imparts a blow to the bolt at the time that thereceiver reaches its stop position. The bolt is rotated out of thebreechlocked position by balanced cam follower means fixed to the framethat follow the cam surfaces, and upon return to the breechlocked lockposition, the entire assembly travels as a unit to the battery positionwith a loaded cartridge in the chamber. A safety tappet pin engages aspiral groove in the bolt to prevent premature firing before the actionhas reached an appropriate position. The bolt is adapted with uniqueejection means, which ejects the spent cartridge case forward and awayfrom the shooters head and face.

2 Claims, 13 Drawing Figures PATENTEU 0562 51375 SHEETZUFG [NVEN TOR.M416? Y 14 SANFORD PATENTEI] DECZS I975 SHEET 8 0F 6 Q Em I N VENTOR. HARR Y W SANFORD flie A TTO/Q/VE Y5.

AUTOMATIC HAND GUN BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION This invention relatesgenerally to hand guns which have recoilactuated mechanisms, forbreech-locking with rotational motion, and for loading and cocking.

There have been several attempts to produce a hand gun capable of firinglarge caliber, high power cartridges at high muzzle velocities, but inthe past, all such inventions have failed due to inherent weaknesses inconcept.

A hand gun with rotating breech lock was invented by Andreas WilhelmSchwarzlose, shown in a patent issued in Britain in 1892, British Pat.No. 23,881, to be followed by British Pat. No. 1934 of 1898 in Englandto the same inventor. Only the model of 1898 had the rotating breechlock, and in this model the blot rotation was accomplished by a singlegroove engaging a pin which acted as cam follower to rotate the bolt.The frame was substantially open, and the force applied to the bolt wasunbalanced, thereby creating binding stresses in rotation. To quote thebook on such weapons, called The Hand Gun, by Geoffrey Boothroyd, Aswith most of the self-loading dinosaurs, the Schwarzlose will work quitesatisfactorily when kept clean and lubricated. Avery well-made pistol,it is a delight to handle, but the mechanism is too complex, and thereare far too many parts for it to function with any degree of reliabilityunder anything but the most benign conditions.

This quotation reflects the fact that the design did not take intoaccount the dynamics and directions of forces required to rotate andreturn the bolt, and to operate the breech-locking mechanism, as well asfor the timing and positioning of the barrel to insure feeding of thecartridges.

At about this same period there was invented in England the Mars pistolwhich is shown in Bristish Pat. No. 14,777, issued Aug. 17, 1900. Thisfollowed a previous design granted British Pat. No. 9067 in 1898. Thispistol and its history was completely described in The Gun Digest for1961 published by The Gun Digest Company, Chicago, Illinois. To quote amilitary report cited in the article, The recoil of these pistols isvery severe. Mr. Fairfax should be asked whether he could alter the.45-inch pistol so as to give a velocity not greater than 1000 f.s., andas much less down to 800 as he could arrange for. In other portions ofthis article, it is pointed out that the certainty of action was notvery good, particularly in the smaller size cartridges. To quote atechnical report included in the article, The pistol has jammed severaltimes, the last time necessitating stripping before it could be madesafe. The cause of this jam was apparently the crimping of thecartridges in the magazine... No one who fired once with the pistolwished to shoot with it again. Several of those who fired are good shotsand in the Excellents Pistol Team.

Thus, it can be seen from past records that attempts to make asemi-automatic hand gun to perform with large caliber, high-velocitybullets have been failures, and it is the object of this invention toovercome previ ous difficulties with a design that provides for apractical firearm that will handle the loads and calibers requiredwithout discomfort to the user. A further object of this invention is toprovide rotary return motion to a rotary-locking breech bolt through theuse of a torsion spring loaded by the initial unlocking action of abreech bolt. A further object of this invention is to provide a hand gunwith a slidable receiver to contain the action for absorbing excessenergy of recoil. Still a fur- 5 ther object of the invention is toprovide safety means to prevent premature firing of the gun until allparts of the action are locked and in their rest position ready forfiring. Still another object of the invention is to provide for feedingof ammunition into the chamber without regard to the position of thechamber with respect to the magazine during the firing cycle. Still afurther object is to provide for a balanced camming action for rotationof the bolt due to recoil, and to prevent a binding of action under thestresses and speed of recoil imparted function. Still another object ofthe invention is to provide for mechanical accelerator means to utilizeexcess recoil energy of the barrel and receiver assembly to impart anadded thrust to the bolt after disengagement (unlocking) of thebreech-locking means in order to provide energy for the extraction,cocking and loading operations.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In accordance with the teaching of the presentinvention, there is provided a frame for the pistol which issubstantially open, but which is provided with a cylindrical bridgingmember across the rear of the open frame which carries a cross-pin toact as a cam follower for a bolt which is provided with a through-slothaving cam means formed thereupon, to be acted upon by the cross-pin. Asemi-circular, tubular receiver has the gun barrel threadably mounted toit and bears spline-type breech-locking means. A cartridge chamber isformed at the end of the barrel which opens into the receiver. A torsionspring is provided at the end of the bolt opposite the breech-lockingend to be loaded by the unlocking rotation of the bolt occurring underrecoil action in order to store energy for aiding the cross-pin to thethrough-slot cam means to rotate and relock the breech-locking action ofthe bolt. A rotary mechanical accelerator, in the form of a partialdisc, is swivelly mounted to the receiver of the hand gun to provide forstriking of the accelerator by the frame of the gun at the conclusion ofrecoil motion of the receiver'barrel assembly, which causes theaccelerator to strike the bolt at the precise moment that the bolt isrotated out of breech-locking relationship to the receiver in order toimpact an additional rearward thrust on the bolt to aid in loadingcertain return springs, in cocking the hammer, in extracting the spentcartridge and in feeding a new cartridge.

All the above features can be understood by reference to the followingspecification in which a detailed description of the preferredembodiment of the invention appears.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a side elevation, partiallyin cutaway crosssection, of the presently preferred embodiment of theinvention;

FIG. 2 is a partial side elevation, partially in cutaway cross-section,of the embodiment of FIG. I seen from the opposite side;

FIG. 3 is a cross-section taken on line 3-3 of FIG.

FIG. 4 is a cross-section taken on line 4-4 of FIG.

FIG. 5 is a cross-section taken on line 5-5 of FIG.

FIG. 6 is a cross-section taken on line 66 of FIGS. a and 10b;

FIG. 7 is a fragmentary cross-section of the side elevation of FIG. 4taken at line 7-7 therein, showing details of constructions;

FIG. 8 is a cross-section taken on line 8-8 of FIG. 4;

FIG. 9 is a side elevation, partially in cutaway crosssection, to showadditional details of construction of FIG. 1;

FIGS. 10a and 1012 are exploded views of the embodiment of FIG. 1,showing the details of the component parts. These FIGS. match as anoverlay at the lower right-hand corner of FIG. 10a and the upperleft-hand corner of FIG. 10b;

FIG. 11 is a fragmentary side elevation of the embodiment of FIG. 1; and

FIG. 12 is an end view, partially in cross-section, taken on line l212of FIGS. 10a and 10b.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT As seen in FIG. 1, theinvention comprises a pistol having a barrel threadably engaged bythreads 21 to a tubular barrel extension-receiver 22. The receiver 22has an external extraction port 23 which leads to an internalcylindrical bore 24. This bore 24 has an opening 26 to the frame 25 ofthe pistol. This opening 26 can be seen on the exploded views of FIGS. 810a and 1012. A series of locking splines 27 is formed in the receiver22 adajcent the barrel 20. There is an undercut 28 between the screwthreads 21 and the locking splines 27 which permits turning and lockingof the bolt 30 after the external splines 29 have passed axially throughsplines 28 into the recess. When so rotated, the splines bear againstone another to lock the slot in a breechlocking action. This is bestshown in FIGS. 8, 10a and 10b. A pair of slideways 31 and 32 engageslots 34 and 33 to slidably mount the barrel-receiver assembly to theframe 25. A rotatable locking key 35 (FIG. 2) engages a slot 36 in thereceiver 22 to prevent the receiver 22 from sliding out of assembly withthe frame 25 when the bolt breech-locking means is disengaged. Thelocking key 35 is rotated out of engagement for disassembly by lever 37as may be seen in phanton line in FIG. 2. A mechanical rotaryaccelerator 38 (FIGS. 4 and 8) is rotatably mounted to the receiver 22by the accelerator plate 39. One end 40 of the accelerator 38 contactsthe bolt 30, while the other end of the accelerator has a protrusion 41which is adapted to strike a portion of the frame 25 at surface 42.Accelerator plate 39 is mounted to receiver 22 by pin 63 as shown inFIGS. 8, 10a and 10b, and is wholly contained within the receiver 22,along with the accelerator 38 as can be seen in FIGS. 7 and 8.

The accelerator plate 39 is pinned to the receiver 22 by pin 63 so thatthe flat surface 120, as shown in FIG. 7, abuts surface 121 of receiver22. The radius surface 123a of accelerator plate 39 matches the radiussurface 123 of the accelerator 38. This surface-to-surface contactprovides bearing action for rotary transmission of the acceleratingforce from the motion of the receiver 22 to the bolt 30 and alsoprovides surface-tosurface transmission of reactive force from theaccelerator 38 through the accelerator plate 39 to the receiver 22.

The bolt 30, as can be seen in FIGS. 10a and 10!), has a through-slot 43which has formed on its oposing faces cam surfaces 44 and dwell portions45 and 46. The bolt 30 has a longitudinal passage 47 which slidablymounted a firing pin 48. One end of the passage 47 is enlarged to forman enlarged bore 51 to accept a helical torsion spring 49. This torsionspring 49 has tangs bent radially toward the center at each end, asexemplified by tang 50, and one tang 50 engages a recess in the enlargedbore 51, while the opposite tang 50a engages a recess in the cockingpiece 52 (FIG. 10b). The torsion spring is thereby reacted against thebolt and against the frame (the cocking piece being mounted to theframe). The cocking piece 52 is adapted with lug slots 54 to matchmounting lugs 53 on the bolt 30 and so may be removably mounted to thebolt 30. The bolt lugs 53 pass through the lug slots 54 as the cockingpiece 52 is rotated from its vertical position, and there is a clearancegroove 110 behind the lug slots 54 which permits the cocking piece to berotated to its vertical position, thus locking the cocking piece to thebolt, but yet permitting the necessary rotation of the bolt 30. This maybe seen in FIG. 9 most clearly.

In FIGS. 10a and 10b, the through-slot 43, with camming surfaces 44 torotate the bolt 30 in conjunction with cam-follower pin 117, is shownDwell surfaces 45 and 46 permit longitudinal motion of the bolt 30without rotation during motion with the breech locked to hold it to thereceiver and also without rotation by itself after having been unlockedby initial rotation.

DUring the continuing description of this invention, the muzzle end ofthe gun will be defined as the front, the hammer end of the gun as therear, the left side of the gun is that side which is towards the leftwhen the gun is held with the muzzle pointing away from the holder, andthe right side is that side which is toward the right when the gun isheld in the hand with the muzzle pointing away from the holder.

The cocking piece 52 is retained in assembly with the frame by a pair ofspring retainer rods 55 and 56, which are installed within springs 57and 58. Retainer rods 55 and 56 are assembled with springs 57 and 58through enclosed channels 59 and 60, which are disposed at the top ofthe frame 25 and displaced laterally from the centerline on the rightand left sides of the frame 25. The centerline, as referred to in thisand in other parts of the description, is the centerline that passesthrough the bore of the barrel and is common with the bore of thereceiver 22 and the bolt 30. A pair of frame inserts 61 and 62 act asbearing guides for rods 55 and 56, and the rods 55 and 56 are threadablyengaged with the cocking piece 52 and locked in place with nylon threadlocking means.

The trigger 64 is pivotally mounted to the frame by pin 65, which formsa portion of bolt hold-back lever 66. Hold-back lever 66 acts inconjunction with safety lever 67, which has a fiat portion 68 that actsas a cam to push on the surface 69 of hold-back lever 66, when thesafety lever 67 is depressed, to raise bolt hold-back lever 66 so thatits protrusion finger 70 engages a face of bolt 30 to hold the bolt 30open in the rear position. Lever 66 has a transversely extending portion71 which has a lower surface 72 which is adapted to be engaged by aportion of the magazine follower 73 so that, upon the firing of the lastcartridge, lever 66 is pushed upwards so that its protrusion finger willhold the bolt open, signalling time to remove the empty magazine 74 andreplace with a fresh loaded one. Safety lever 67 is mounted to rotate inthe frame 25 extending from the left through to the right side of theframe and having a protruding cylindrical finger 75 which acts in thecam recess 76 of the trigger safety plate 77 to rotate the triggersafety plate 77- downward on pin 78, permitting trigger bar support pin79 to be lowered, preventing the trigger bar 82 from releasing the sear91, and thus firing the gun. Thus, the safety lever 67 has threepositions: horizontal, or center, which is the firing position; down,which is the bolt hold-open position; and up, which is the triggersafety position. All three of these positions being signalled and heldin place by detent 80 and detent spring 81, which are mounted in theframe 25. Trigger bar 82 is pivotally mounted to trigger 64 by pin 83,and pin 83 also mounts the trigger spring 84, which acts to hold thetrigger forward out of firing position. Compression spring 85 acts tosupport trigger bar 82 and return it to pre-firing position upon releaseof the safety.

The hammer 86 is pivotally mounted to the frame 25 by pin 87 and has aspring 88, spring follower 89, and strut 90 to apply firing pressures ina conventional manner to a firing pin 48, previously described. The sear91 holds the trigger at full or half-cock position and is released byaction of the trigger bar 82 to release hammer 86 for firing. A tappetpin 92 acts on surface 93 of the trigger bar 82, the nose 94 of thetappet pin 92 following the surface of bolt 30 until the tappet pin 92reaches a point where the nose 94 enters a spiral groove 112 (FIG. 11)with a deepened recess 111 at the point 93a where the bolt and receiverare locked together and in the forward battery position ready forfiring. At this time the spring 85 acts to push the trigger bar upwardsagainst the tappet pin 92, pushing the nose 94 into the recess 111 andplacing the trigger bar 82 in firing position for releasing the sear 91,as can be seen in FIG. 5. Therefore, the action is saftied until thepistol is in battery position ready for firing. The straight groove 113allows for the tappet pin 92 to remain engaged in safety positionduringnon-rotational motion of the bolt 30.

A conical surface 95 (FIG. 10b) of the frame 25 acts to guide bulletsfrom the magazine into the chamber of the receiver 22. The length ofthis conical surface 95 allows the bullets to be fed into the chamber atany point along the sliding motion of the action of the receiver 22 inconjunction with asimilar conical lead surface at the adajcent forwardend of the receiver adjacent the interior locking splines 116.

The bolt 30 has a unique ejection feature as shown in FIG. 12 in whichthe bolt 30 has a recessed front face 98 and a spring-loaded ejector pin99, which is springloaded by spring 100. A pivoted extractor 101 (FIG.10a) is mounted on the bolt 30, and the extractor 101 has a hook end 102which protrudes into the recess 98 to extract the spent cartridge case.The spent cartridge case is blownback by the force of the firing toforce back the hooked end 102 of extractor 101 against spring pressureof spring 103, which is located in a recess in the bolt 30 tospring-load the pivotally-mounted extractor 101, and when the cartridgecase has forced the hook end 102 back and is seated in the recess 98 0fthe bolt 30, the hook 102 retains the raised edge of the cartridge caseand the bolt, in its backward motion,

extracts the cartridge case from the chamber, until a point where theextraction port 105 in the receiver 22 is passed by the cartridge, andthe pressure of ejector pin 99 against the end of the cartridge caseflings the empty case out of the extraction port 105.

The entire function of the firearm is described as follows: In batteryor rest position, the bolt 30 is breechlocked to the receiver 22 with acartridge in place in the chamber and the hammer 66 cocked. Pulling thetrigger 64 raises the trigger bar 82, actuating the sear 91, whichreleases hammer 86, striking firing pin 48, to discharge the cartridge.The reaction of the discharge of the bullet causes the assembly ofbarrel 20, receiver 22, and bolt 30 to travel backwards as a unit untilthe movement of the receiver 22 is stopped by the frame 25. At thispoint, the rotary accelerator 38 strikes a portion of the frame 25 andimparts a blow to the bolt 30 at the same time that the cam follower pin117 has rotated the bolt 30 on cam surfaces 44 to free the lockingsplines 29. The added energy to the bolt 30, given by the impact ofrotary accelerator 38 drives the bolt backwards until its motion islimited by the cam follower pin 117. In rotating bolt 30 to unlock thesplines 29, torsion spring 49 is pre-loaded and, during recoil of thebarrel 20, receiver 22 and bolt 30 assembly, as well as during theindependent motion of the bolt 30, return springs 57 and 58 arecompressed. As the bolt 30 travels backwards, it extracts the cartridgefrom the chamber and flings it out of the extractor port. DUring thisbackward motion, the tappet pin 92 presses the trigger bar 82 down,preventing premature firing of the pistol. After reaching the extremebackward position, at which point the pistol is cocked for the nextfiring, the bolt returns and is rotated under the stored energy oftorsion spring 49 into breech-locking relationship with the receiver 22,and the entire assembly of the action returns to battery position underthe urging of compression springs 57 and 58. During its return motion,the bolt 30 pushes a new cartridge into the chamber of receiver 22.

As in all hand guns of this same general configuration, the frame 25includes a grip member and a cartridge clip chamber 131 formed withinthe grip member.

As in all modern pistols, the barrel 20 has an internal, spiral riflingthat imparts a spin to the bullet to provide a straight and true flight,move first, without tumbling end-for-end, or wobbling and losingprecision. For right-hand rifling, the bullet would spin to the right,and the spinning bullet, as well as expanding gases, would impart areactive left-hand torque to the barrel which the shooters hand wouldhave to overcome. 1n the present invention, the rotating bolt imparts areactive torque to the frame 25 of the pistol through the cam pin 117.Therefore, by having a left-hand rotation on the bolt, the reactivetorque on pin 117 would be of righthand, and so would help offset theleft-hand reactive torque of the bullet, thus giving a steadier firingof the firearm and less strain on the shooter. At the conclusion of itsrearward motion, the receiver 22 is free to travel forward beforeengagement with the returning bolt and, at any point in the returnmotion, it can receive the new bullet. After the last bullet has beenfired, the follower 73 of the magazine 74 pushes up on the bolthold-back bar, holding the bolt open to signal that reloading isnecessary and saving the shotter the trouble of opening the bolt toinsert a new magazine for reloading. The bolt may be held open after theempty magazine is extracted by pushing down on the saftey lever 67 tohold the hold-open bar 66 upwards.

This invention is not to be limited by the embodiment shown in thedrawings and described in the description, which is given by way ofexample and not of limitation, but only in accordance with the scope ofthe appended claims.

I claim:

1. In an automatic pistol having a frame and a recoil actuated boltmounted to said frame and rotated by cam means for breech-locking withspline means, and by primary recoil energy imparted to said bolt by therecoil of a barrel and receiver assembly, and having a trigger mechanismfor firing, improvements which comprise:

torsion spring means, said torsion spring means engaging the bolt andthe frame of said pistol and being reacted against each of them, saidtorsion spring means being pre-loaded by unlocking rotation of saidbolt, and said torsion spring means releasing stored energy for rotationof said bolt to breech-lock the same;

and a cocking member mounting said bolt for rotation comprising a pairof compression spring mounting rods, a pair of compression springs, saidcompression springs being mounted on said rods, and a pair of closedchannels, said channels being formed one on each side of said frame,said rods being slidably mounted in said channels for compressing saidcompression springs for returning said bolt, said barrel, and saidreceiver, said rods mounting said cocking member to the frame.

2. Improvements according to claim 1, comprising tappet pin meansmounted to the frame, said tappet pin means being in contact with anexternal surface of said bolt, said bolt having a recess in saidexternal surface, said recess seating said tappet pin when said bolt isin its breech-locked position for firing, said tappet pin preventingfiring by the trigger mechanism when the bolt is out of breech-lockedposition, and said tappet pin releasing said trigger mechanism forfiring when it is seated.

UNITED STATES PATENT oTTTcE QETIFIQATE 0F QGEQTIQN Patent No. 3,780,618Dated December 25, 1973 Inventor(s) HA 0 SANF RD It is certified thaterror appears in the above-identified patent and that said LettersPatent are hereby corrected as shown below:

Col. 1, line 17 "blot" should read "bolt-=- Col, 1, line 42 'l96l,"'should read --l96l",--

Col. 2, line 48 "impact" should read --impart-- C019 3, line 31 insert acomma after "8" Colo 3, line 48 "phantom" should read --phantom-- C0104, line 4 'oposing" should read --opposing-- Cole 4, line 7 "mounted"should read -mounts-- C010 4, line 33 "DUring" should read --During--C010 5, line 20 "COmpression" should read "Compression" Cole 6, line 9"66' should read "86-- C01. 6, line 67 "shotter" should read --shooter--this ay of March 1977 ned and RUTH C. MASON C. MARSHALL DANN AnesringOfficer Commissioner uflatenlx and Trademarks UNITED STATES PATENTOFFICE CERTIFICATE OF CORRECTION Patent No. 3,780,618 Dated December 25,1973 Inventor s) HARRY W SANFORD It is certified that error appears inthe above-identified patent and that said Letters Patent are herebycorrected as shown below:

Col. 1, line 17 "blot" should read --bolt-- Col. 1, line 42 l96l,"'should read --l96l",--

Col. 2, line 48 "impact" should read --impart-- C010 3, line 31 insert acomma after "8" Cole 3, line 48 "phanton" should read --phantom-- Col.4, line 4 "oposing" should read -opposing-- Cola 4, line 7 "mounted"should read --mounts--- C010 4, line 33 "DUring" should read --During--Cole 5, line 20 "COmpression" should read --Compression-- C010 6, line 9"66" should read --86-- C01. 6, line 67 "shotter" should read--shooter-- Signed and Scaled this First D y of March 1977 [SEAL] Anest:

T MASON t. MARSHALL DANN Arresting Officer Commissioner uflalems andTrademarks

1. In an automatic pistol having a frame and a recoil actuated boltmounted to said frame and rotated by cam means for breechlocking withspline means, and by primary recoil energy imparted to said bolt by therecoil of a barrel and receiver assembly, and having a trigger mechanismfor firing, imprOvements which comprise: torsion spring means, saidtorsion spring means engaging the bolt and the frame of said pistol andbeing reacted against each of them, said torsion spring means beingpre-loaded by unlocking rotation of said bolt, and said torsion springmeans releasing stored energy for rotation of said bolt to breechlockthe same; and a cocking member mounting said bolt for rotationcomprising a pair of compression spring mounting rods, a pair ofcompression springs, said compression springs being mounted on saidrods, and a pair of closed channels, said channels being formed one oneach side of said frame, said rods being slidably mounted in saidchannels for compressing said compression springs for returning saidbolt, said barrel, and said receiver, said rods mounting said cockingmember to the frame.
 2. Improvements according to claim 1, comprisingtappet pin means mounted to the frame, said tappet pin means being incontact with an external surface of said bolt, said bolt having a recessin said external surface, said recess seating said tappet pin when saidbolt is in its breech-locked position for firing, said tappet pinpreventing firing by the trigger mechanism when the bolt is out ofbreech-locked position, and said tappet pin releasing said triggermechanism for firing when it is seated.